OTTAWA – A new bridge that will span Canada’s busiest border crossing with the United States is expected to cost $5.7 billion.
The Crown corporation overseeing the construction of the Gordie Howe International Bridge says the price tag includes the costs of designing, building, operating and maintaining the bridge and its ports of entry on both sides of the border for 30 years.
The bridge authority says the cost would have been more than $6.2 billion if the Canadian government had decided not to partner with a private-sector consortium and to foot the entire bill itself.
Construction of the six-lane, 2.5-kilometre cable-stayed bridge will provide a second span connecting Windsor, Ont., and Detroit — but it won’t be open to traffic until the end of 2024.
The Canadian government expects to pay for the bridge by collecting tolls. It agreed years ago to take on the cost of the project in order to bypass Congress, which had refused to sign off on American funding.
About one-quarter of all goods traded annually between Canada and the U.S. passes through the Detroit-Windsor corridor.